


Marks of Compassion

by Tarlan



Series: Marks of Daggoth [1]
Category: Darklight (2004)
Genre: Gen, Redemption
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-01-01
Updated: 2006-01-01
Packaged: 2017-10-15 07:33:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/158521
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tarlan/pseuds/Tarlan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lilith feels the first stirring of a new emotion as she faces Anders Raeborne in the form of the demonicos.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Marks of Compassion

Lilith picked up the steel lid and prepared to strike. The Faith wanted this creature's head because within its brain lay the means to make a vaccine against the red plague.

"Please don't kill him." Lilith turned to glare at the old man she had saved from the demonicos. "He's my son."

She faltered, thinking of another father with a heart filled with grief for the son she had killed. The old man's hand reached out and touched her arm, his eyes pleading.

"There is good in him. I know this. Please," he implored, "he is my son."

Lilith looked back at the demonicos. Its hands, feet, and even parts of its great wings were stuck in the industrial strength adhesive, and the coarse membranes of wing had torn to ragged strips as the demonicos struggled to free itself. She could feel the waves of anger and hatred pouring off him like a dark sickness but she understood his pain, seeing an image of herself in the black hearted creature snarling back at her. She understood rejection, understood what it meant to be cast out and to live alone, without purpose, without love.

According to The Faith, she was Lilith, Adam's first wife who had refused to be subordinate to the mate God had intended for her, and was cursed by him. She had endured, taking out her rage on all who came upon her. Man, woman, and child had fallen to her terrible wrath. In contrast, this creature had not lived the span of even a single human life. He had slaughtered, and had unleashed a plague of biblical proportions upon the Earth but not solely by his own hand. Others had taken a role in nurturing his anger, and in feeding his wrath.

Chapel had encouraged Anders Raeborne to continue with his experiments with darklight, withholding vital information at Raeborne's cost. This creature lying helpless before her carried a plague more deadly than any other known on this planet. If he lived then all life on earth would come to an end. Except, that was not strictly true for Chapel had shown her and Shaw that he had a cure for the disease. She had seen him use it upon himself when the demonicos turned on its master but Chapel did not intend to share that cure. He wanted the red plague to spread across the face of the Earth. He wanted to bring humanity to Judgment Day and had used Anders Raeborne as his tool.

The demonicos lashed out at her again with its lizard-like tongue and she used the steel lid as a shield to slap it away, recalling how it had attacked Shaw, sending the deadly plague straight into his blood. She had wanted to find more of the cure to give to Shaw but he had ordered her to go after the demonicos, putting the lives of the world above his own. By now Shaw would be dead, and that thought filled her with grief.

She raised the lid again, infusing it with darklight, ready to strike. Once she had stopped the demonicos then she would hunt down Chapel and take revenge for the death of William Shaw.

"Please! I beg of you."

Again she faltered. Shaw had asked her to keep the body count down as they escaped from detention. At the time, she had obliged him purely to show that she could be benevolent. She had incapacitated rather than maimed or killed but nothing had stirred within her. Not even the slightest sense of relief for having a little less blood on her hands. Yet, as she looked down into the hate filled eyes of the creature helplessly caught before her, the father's voice stirred her soulless heart, setting an ache within it that burned deep into her body.

Someone had believed in her. Someone had faith in her redemption, believing she could be saved despite the death and carnage she had caused to mankind since the dawn of time. Was this creature any different from her? And if she had deserved a chance of redemption then surely he did too.

Lilith hurled the lid, slicing the air just above the head of the demonicos where her intention had been to sever its head from its body. Taking a piece of talos wood from her belt, she stabbed it into the foul creature and watched as it collapsed. Made from her own darklight, it was susceptible to her own weakness. Quickly she gagged it to prevent it from attacking.

With the threat neutralized, the older Raeborne stepped forward and knelt as close as he dared, trying to avoid the adhesive. He reached out and touched the leathery membrane of one wing; the creature turned its head towards the old man, its eyes burning with hatred.

"Anders," Raeborne breathed softly, as he caressed the dark flesh of the immortal daemon. He looked back to Lilith his eyes filled with gratitude. "Thank you."

Pain flared within Lilith, her flesh burning with a heat that swept through her body. She looked down at her wrist and watched as the fourth mark of Daggoth glowed brightly. She hissed in pain as the raised mark was absorbed into her body, feeling it pass through her body until it reached her throat. With sharp talons, she clawed it out, tearing at her flesh until she had the symbol lying solid in her hand, understanding its meaning before it evaporated with a soft hiss.

The first curse had left her body after she sacrificed herself to save the life of a child. It did not matter that she was immortal for she had not known that at the time. Her singular act of penance this time had been one of compassion, something she had never known for another living creature before this day.

Anders felt the scalpel slice away pieces of his brain. Knowing this could not kill him was immaterial for the pain consumed him even as the darklight sought to repair the damage. He could not escape the relentless pressure for his head was clamped tightly to the operating table. He could not even snarl or use his tongue to force away his attackers for he was muzzled by a steel mesh. They had cracked open the hard bone of his skull with a saw, and he could still hear the buzz whining in his ears. Restraints held his arms, legs and torso secure, and they had bound his wings to his body in ribbons of steel. Talos wood in his blood stream made him weak, too weak to fight the bonds, leaving him no option but to endure.

Eventually, the pain eased as the surgeons completed their task of extracting the virus from his brain so they could commence work on a vaccine.

Anders felt the brain tissue repair quickly, followed by the knitting of bone across his skull until he was whole once more. It took what little darklight remained in his body and he fell into a stupor.

When he next awoke, he was still restrained but just a flicker of his eyes told him he had reverted back to his human form. A soft shuffle and a scrape of a chair caught his attention and he pulled his head around. His lips tightened in anger as he saw his father seated beside him but, before he could rage, his father reached out and brushed at his hair. His hand caressed Anders' cheek and cupped his chin to hold him; their eyes met.

"I know you believed I wronged you. I know you believe I threw you to the wolves, that I am a hypocrite for condemning your methods while making use of your great accomplishments," the older Raeborne sighed. "I was angry with you... but I never stopped loving you, my son. Believe that even if you can believe nothing else."

Anders snarled and shook his head free from his father's grasp, turning away in disgust. He refused to acknowledge his father's call of his name, focusing intently on the wall beneath the mirror that stretched across one side of the room. With a resigned sigh, Professor Raeborne pushed up from his seat and moved slowly to the door. However, he paused on the threshold.

"I love you, Anders. I've loved you from the day the midwife placed you into my arms, and I will continue to love you until the end of time."

Then he was gone, and Anders felt a burn in his chest as some of the weight of his anger dissipated. Everything he had done had been for his father, wanting to prove he was as good a scientist, wanting to see the love and pride shining in his father's eyes. That was the demon that had driven him to take risks with the experiments, callously ignoring the evidence and causing irreparable damage and the horrific deaths of his test subjects, risks that the others, including his father, had deemed unacceptable. Yet he had learned something new with each and every death, and the Raeborne Institute had used the results of his experiments to perfect the longevity drug.

Anders had made those scientists pay for condemning him while stealing his work, having tested the final serum of darklight upon his own flesh.

He felt an itch and glanced down at his restrained arm. Five symbols were raised in his flesh and he knew they represented the Marks of Daggoth, God's curse upon him, for he had seen those same marks on Lilith. He smiled without humor for, at this moment in time, he could not care less.

Lilith stared through the one-way mirror into the room where they held Anders Raeborne, feeling saddened for the older Raeborne as he tried to reach his son even as Anders turned away from him.

"Did I make the right decision in saving him?"

Anders' father paused on the threshold and the son's face remained impassive at the emotional declaration but, as soon as the door closed, she saw the fleetest sign of regret flit across the handsome face, and she smiled. The Prefect laid his hand upon her arm, turning it to reveal the three remaining marks raised in her flesh.

"God believes so, and who am I to argue against such great wisdom?"

END


End file.
